


But I guess I'm already there

by elliceluella



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Idiots in Love, Love Confessions, M/M, Post-Season/Series 03, slow start
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-04
Updated: 2018-11-04
Packaged: 2019-08-17 15:15:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16518938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elliceluella/pseuds/elliceluella
Summary: Loving Matt Murdock has never been easy, but after the Daredevil of it all, after Nelson, Murdock & Page is real, after the promise ofno more secretsis kept: it’s outright difficult. But Foggy has never been one to shy away from a challenge- not when he was a kid walking around telling anybody who would listen that he owned Nelson’s Meats, and definitely not now.





	But I guess I'm already there

**Author's Note:**

> It's set post S3, but Father Lantom is alive and well because yours truly refuses to believe that Paul Lantom would be absent in a world where our boys are happy.

Foggy curls up with his mug of hot cocoa by the window, too lost in thought to pay any attention to the TV. It’s one of those quiet nights where solitude and dipping temperatures work fiendishly together until things previously pushed to the ‘stop thinking about it’ corner slink out and yowl like a cat until attention is given.

Loving Matt Murdock has never been easy, but after the Daredevil of it all, after Nelson, Murdock & Page is real, after the promise of _no more secrets_ is kept: it’s outright difficult. Because truth can be terribly bitter to swallow— he holds Matt and weeps after Matt tells him that he tried to kill himself, weeps imagining a reality where he only learns that Matt was alive after it’s too late— it can also crawl in at three in the morning bloody and bruised and knowing it’s not going to stop. But Foggy has never been one to shy away from a challenge- not when he was a kid walking around telling anybody who would listen that he owned Nelson’s Meats, and definitely not now.

It’s not long before Foggy becomes good at anticipating what Matt needs— he also adds to his catalog of Matts until Distracted Matt and Weight Of The World On His Shoulders Matt are just two in a sea of Matts that Foggy familiarizes himself with— because even though Matt’s getting better at asking for help, it’s still a work in progress. More often than not, the conflict on Matt’s face is painfully clear: frustration at himself, yet touched that Foggy knows him so well. It’s times like these that he doesn’t know if a gentle touch would do more harm than good.

But the fact of the matter remains. Whenever Matt reaches out, figuratively and literally, Foggy always reaches back, and he holds on tight.

That’s not to say he doesn’t love Marci because, god, he does, but she’s never been anybody’s fool. Even before they were together, she knew he loved Matt in a way that he’d never love anyone else, knew the exact moment Foggy fell for his sweet, dorky roommate before Foggy himself got a clue. She loved him and knew he loved her, but she also knew her worth. Marci Stahl was too good to settle as anyone’s second choice.

There wasn’t any need to tell her what he’d told Karen about never bailing on Matt— she’d already known.

When the whole thing with Fisk was over and Foggy told her he wasn’t going back to the firm, she simply smiled and stroked his cheek. “You deserve all the happiness in the world, Foggy bear,” she said. “You’re one of the good ones.” They cried as they hugged goodbye, then she held his face in her hands. The next six words she uttered still sits warm and heavy in his heart. “Be patient with him, and yourself.”

*

His hot cocoa is more cool sludge than a warm respite when he looks down. Foggy tucks his feet up under him and curls the fingers of his free hand against the armrest of his chair absently, warm skin against cool leather. He’s always loved this chair but he loves it even more now, because this chair has been with Foggy through some crazy months, and that includes making the trek from his lavish apartment to Matt’s place.

Sometimes he still can’t believe any of this: Matt coming back, getting the band back together, _living_ with Matt, is even real.

It certainly didn’t feel like it at the time, because Matt’s mouth had twisted into something sad and unhappy when Foggy told him about the breakup. The music was its usual at Josie’s: loud, but they were in their own little bubble, shut off from the rest of the world.

“Come on Matty, what’s that face for?” Foggy had asked.

“I can’t help but feel like this is partially my fault,” Matt said, and oh boy, if only he knew _._  It was by sheer luck alone that Foggy reined in the loose lips drinks at Josie’s usually caused.

“So where you going to stay? Your parents?” Matt nudged the back of Foggy’s hand with his wrist and it made Foggy smile, because he had missed this, the conversations, the easiness between them instead of careful niceties, the way Matt got extra tactile after he’d had a few.

“At least until I can find something. Probably, yeah.”

“Oh.” And then Matt tilted his head, lost in thought, except it kept going down until it was effectively resting on Foggy’s shoulder. “Hmm,” was all he’d said, after a while.

“What?” Foggy asked, more laughter than question.

Matt mumbled something incoherent until Foggy poked him in the cheek. “Matty.”

Matt whined and swiped at Foggy but sat up eventually, face a shade redder than it was a moment ago.

“Would you want, I mean— uh.” Matt frowned, bit his lip, and huffed. “Do you miss it? Because I— I want to spend more time with you, the way we did back in law school.” Foggy had to strain his ears to catch that last part.

It took Foggy awhile to understand what Matt was trying to say, and by the time he did he’d also caught two words that sounded suspiciously like “ _move in”_ amidst the jumble of words that Matt had started to hide under a mumble again.

“If you’re asking me what I think you’re asking then yes. Like totally, one hundy percent, yes. But if it’s not then that’s cool too just blame it on the beer uh, goggles or something.”

Matt’s face, still flushed the prettiest shade of pink, lit up like- like something Foggy didn’t quite have the words for in that moment. “You mean it? You’d be roomies with me again?” Matt asked, and the hope in Matt’s expression was just this side of too much.

“Yeah, Matty.” Foggy nudged their knees together and returned Matt’s smile in full. “For as long as you’ll have me.”

And have him Matt did, as well as his armchair, sleeper sofa and that plush rug that always puts a dumb smile on Matt’s face whenever he wriggles his toes. It’s silly, but those little things help when believing how he got here feels a tad impossible.

Of course, it’s only a temporary arrangement, at least until he can find an apartment with a suitable price tag that’s not too far from Matt’s place. Foggy’s diligent about looking for his own place, he really is, it’s just that...Matt makes it incredibly hard to want to move out. 

There’s the perennial buying of his favorite comfort foods, soft spoken encouragements when Foggy’s frustrated with a case— so gentle and unexpected that it always startles him and leaves him warm and gooey, and then...and then there’s the story of how his parents met.

That Matt spends his Sundays with his mother speaks volumes about his personal growth, and after Foggy gets over the initial shock that the nun who raised him at the St. Agnes is also his mother, he’s so, _so_ proud that Matt chooses to build a relationship with her instead of staying away and staying angry.

Sometimes they go for ice cream and other times lattes (much to Father Lantom’s glee), but mostly they just talk. What about, Foggy never asks, because it’s something so private that just the thought of asking Matt about it makes Foggy feel wrong.

He’s busy pulling needle and thread through the skin over Matt’s shoulder the night that Matt decides to tell the story; he probably should’ve known there was something more to the soft, wistful smile on Matt’s face (whatever that wasn’t covered by a bag of frozen peas, that is).

“Did you know,” Matt begins, smile still securely in place, “that mum used to stitch dad up after his matches?”

“Hm,” Foggy replies, lips clamped down in concentration.

“She snuck into Fogwell’s with a couple friends, and dad was in the ring. That first night they met she helped take care of him in between rounds. She said she— knew, immediately, and it scared her, because she’d never felt like that about anyone before. And then, after she— after she left the Order she lived with dad. She went to all his matches and they’d always come back together, and stitch him up.”

“Hm.”

“Yeah. She sounded...sad, but also, happy. They had a whole life together, even if it didn’t last forever.” Matt’s voice has never been this tender. It terrifies Foggy in the way unexpected vulnerability does, and doubly so because the story has left both of them open in different ways: Matt that he’s choosing to share something private with Foggy, and Foggy that he could see himself in Jack and Maggie’s history.

He keeps that story, its significance and similarities, locked tight in a corner of his heart.

The thing is, they both know Foggy’s gotten good at understanding what Matt needs, but here is where Foggy draws the line— this isn’t something he’d like to make assumptions on (because that way lies terrible, terrible heartache). Matt’s going to have to ask if he _wants_ this, wants _him,_ because while Foggy knows he pings on Matt’s radar of People Matt Values , he’s not disillusioned enough to assume he’s anywhere as important as a _need_ to Matt.

Rather, he’s the one who needs Matt; goodness knows he was a shell of his former self during those long months, living with a festering, gaping hole in his chest.

Perhaps some would say it’s a waste to love someone the way he does and potentially not have it returned, but Foggy would disagree. After all, this is the life, and the man, that he chose. And choose it he did, because Matt didn’t take that choice away from him by staying gone.

*

The night gets steadily colder as the hours tick by. Foggy grabs his laptop, another pair of socks, and settles into the sleeper sofa- conveniently and strategically located in the living room to catch any wild vigilantes that might walk or crawl in, depending on the severity of injuries.

He's halfway into his work when his phone buzzes.

_Don’t stay up_.

Foggy knows Matt’s not fighting _all_ the time when he’s out, but it still makes him giggle whenever he pictures Matt texting in one hand while doing a flippity kick.

_Make me_. He types back.

He’ll stay up for a few more hours or until his eyelids say otherwise, because living with a vigilante best friend has helped Foggy acquire the skill of dozing until he hears specific noises- the roof access door opening or the occasional groan that sounds like _Foggy, I made a dumb mistake_. If Foggy’s sigh of a reply sounds a little too much like _I love you anyway so don't you dare die on me,_ well, Matt blissfully remains none the wiser.

The first aid kit’s perched on the coffee table, ready. Karen once joked that since it’s become their living room centrepiece, she should buy them a fancy box to hide it in.

The extra socks aren’t quite enough against the cold so Foggy pulls Matt’s old woollen throw over his legs. It makes him think of the yellow one he shared with Marci and a memory comes unbidden, the one where he's jerking awake next to her, then reading about Fisk being out of prison.

_Stay safe_ , Foggy types, but deletes the text before he sends it. It’s ridiculous, borderlining on needy, and that’s the last thing he wants to do because Matt’s already carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. He always tells Matt to stay safe every evening before he heads out anyway; he'll learn to be content with that.

It’s not a bad thing, not remotely, but Foggy doesn’t quite know what to make of the fact that they hold each other through their nightmares now. Matt’s involve Elektra, that much he knows because of all the times Matt cries out her name, while Foggy’s feature the same ones that left him gasping and crying and worrying the hell out of Marci. God, it feels like a lifetime ago. Sometimes though, Matt’s not dead in his nightmares. He simply walks out of their office in jeans and a grey shirt, sad smile on his face as he promises Foggy he won’t try to convince him to give Nelson and Murdock another chance. They don’t touch, because Foggy’s arm is in a sling. They don’t have a proper goodbye either. Those are particularly painful because they’re a play on a real memory.

It’s perplexing that his nightmares still revolve around the theme of Matt leaving him. Maybe it’s punishment for all the times he walked out on Matt, he supposes.

When the nightmares come they crawl into each other’s bed— or sofa, in Foggy’s case— and stay there until the person having the nightmare drifts off again. They hold each other but never talk about it. Matt will open up if he wants to, and only when he’s ready. Foggy doesn’t want to feed the part of him that still wonders if Matt will leave when she returns, and that’s a when, not an if, because only a fool would believe that Elektra Natchios let a building get the better of her.

It pains him whenever he feels the tremble in Matt’s frame or sees the tracks his tears make on his face because Foggy knows he’ll never be able to fix, much less replace the chasm Elektra’s left in her wake. But he stays anyway, loving Matt, patching him up as best he can, holding on for the both of them. He stays because he chooses to, but also because he has no choice. Loving Matt isn’t something he can stop doing.

*

“Why’re you still up?” Matt asks as he makes his way down the stairs, tossing his cowl and gloves into the chest. Foggy shuts his laptop and simply shrugs, laughing when the prolonged silence makes Matt pout and frown in that way that says he doesn't get why he's being messed with. 

“Good night?” Foggy asks although he probably knows the answer already; he'd completed his quick assessment before Matt reached the bottom of the stairs. Matt’s not moving stiffly and there are no visible wounds, he’s also not doing that pinched thing with his face.

“Yeah, pretty much,” Matt replies. “Just a little bruise on my shin.”

A year ago Foggy would be surprised at how open Matt is with his injuries, but now he’s just happy. Well, as happy as one can be when someone he cares about tells him where they’re hurting.

“Go shower, I’ll get the arnica cream out for you.”

Matt grins when he comes back out and sits next to Foggy, clad in sweats and a hoodie. “You’re the best,” he says, picking up the hot mug of cocoa that’s next to the first aid box. Foggy laughs when he spots the socks on Matt’s feet: small, colorful dinosaurs, now faded after multiple cycles in the wash. He got them for Matt when they first started L & Z all those years ago, and it’s the first time he’s seen them on Matt after he came back.

“Which leg?” He asks as he picks up the cream and unscrews the cap.

Matt reaches down with one hand and tugs the right side of his pant leg up to the knee, then shifts so that his leg is resting on Foggy’s lap.

They sit in comfortable silence while Foggy tends to Matt’s shin— or at least, that’s what it felt like to Foggy as he wipes his hands on Matt’s sweats when he's done— until Matt puts his mug down and clears his throat nervously.

“Foggy,” he says, cocoa-warmed hands coming to rest on Foggy’s before they pull away. Foggy looks up at him and makes a curious sound.

“Are—are you happy? Do you regret being here, I mean, with me?”

Foggy frowns. “You know I am. And no, no regrets.” Uneasiness crawls up his neck. “Where’s all this coming from?”

“Nowhere. It’s not a sudden thing. It’s—it’s been there, for a long time, actually.” Matt's face goes through a series of expressions, his fingers fidgeting with Foggy's, and Foggy sighs.

“Matt—”

Matt shakes his head. “These past couple months have been— really great. With you, and Karen, it’s—” Matt’s smile is heartbreakingly vulnerable and Foggy’s breath hitches. “I hope you know that.”

“Y—yeah?” He doesn’t know where Matt’s taking this conversation, pretty much a leaf in a stream at this point, but his pulse’s starting to race.

“I know you have a mental list of little details, you’ve got a good read on me. I, I like it, because it means...more than you’ll know.” Matt takes a deep breath. “I’ve been paying attention too. To you. And sometimes… Foggy, your sighs, your, your voice, the way you touch me when you stitch me up, it just feels so. Like you’re so disappointed. And scared.” Matt’s mouth tenses like he’s in pain.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t...that my nightmares make you worry. I don’t know how to make them stop but I wish you knew how I felt— how I _feel_ about you. And what I dream about. The good ones, when I’m not… I dream that I get to come home to you every single day, that we have what my parents never had. And, and we’re happy,” Matt says, so softly, that all the air leaves Foggy’s lungs. “I want to be _more_ , with you. If you— if you’ll have me.” _If you’ll have me_. Those words ring painfully familiar but Foggy’s drawing a blank, everything’s too much right now.

“I— but. Elektra.” Foggy says, and that creates a sad tug at the corner of Matt’s mouth.

Foggy’s painfully aware that he’s grabbing onto the first thing that comes to mind- his head is spinning and his heart, his heart’s already got a luggage packed, fully prepared to take a vacation out of his chest. He can’t feel his hands, he needs to put this moment on pause, he needs to—

“I know how it must come across, that your nightmares are about me while mine are about someone else, I know how it— like... like I’ll leave in a heartbeat if she returns,” Matt says, and that right there is a punch in the gut. Old dreams, old fears, sour memories where Matt’s never fully alive unless he’s with her, not tied down living a small life as boring Matt Murdock.

There’s a disconnect, and it’s upsetting. Because it’s _really_ nice that Matt’s coming right out and saying what he wants, that he wants to be with _Foggy_ , but it's also terrifying because Matt’s going to talk about Elektra, and the way he talked about Foggy’s fears was...disturbingly intimate. It’s worse than being naked in front of the one person who can paint a picture with his body's reactions, it cuts right to the quick.

“There's a reason why she and I— I think we were too similar and different in the wrong ways, but. I’ll always love her. Just like— I know it’s not the same as you and Marci, but—“

“It’s okay, Matty,” Foggy says hurriedly. But Matt lets it slip even though it’s wrong and untrue and Foggy feels small for feeling that way. If he can love two people, why does it hurt that Matt's like that too? God, his throat is so tight it hurts to breathe.

It’s quick and fleeting, but Matt’s face twists into something angry- it’s not directed at Foggy, but it jolts him anyway.

“No, it is not okay! It’s not okay, not to me. To let you think you’ll always come second to her, to let you think you’re just—” Matt’s upset. He turns pleading eyes to Foggy, squeezes his hands tighter and oh, there they are. Foggy can feel them again. “I thought you didn't want the parts of me that weren't normal, didn't accept me for who I am but I— I was wrong. We've both come a long way. You— I’ll always want you and I— I’ll always need you, Foggy.”

Foggy doesn't know how to react because Matt _knows_ him. Matt _wants_ him. Matt _needs_ him.

It isn’t until Matt gently brushes his fingers against Foggy’s cheek and they come away wet that he realizes he’s crying, or that he’s shaking until strong arms hold him gently against his chest.

“I love you,” Matt says, and Foggy’s gasping through tears before he even registers it.

Matt lets Foggy cling to him, fistfuls of shirt grasped tight in his hands, is so patient with Foggy as he cries and releases the residual fear that deep down this isn’t permanent, that Matt’s going to leave. “I’m here Foggy, ‘m not going anywhere,” Matt soothes into Foggy’s hair, his temple, everywhere of Foggy’s that Matt’s lips can reach. “I'll always come back, I promise.”

They stay where they are until Foggy’s breath calms down. “Sorry,” Foggy says as he slowly pulls away, sniffling, and wipes his nose with the back of his hand. Matt just smiles down at him and brushes a kiss to Foggy’s forehead.

Foggy gives Matt a watery smile in return. “Y’know, some mornings there’ll be a sliver of light that splays across my middle. I’ll put my hard right there and curl my fingers around it, pretend it’s something I can grab on to. That’s how I felt, about us. Like I could feel it, but...I just couldn’t hold it. Or keep it.”

“And now?”

“Now...” Foggy tilts his head and smiles, takes in the look on Matt’s face, soft and happy like he can’t believe he gets to be this happy, relishes as phantom sunlight moves from the soles of his feet to the very top of his head.  “I’m walking on sunshine,” he sings.

Matt groans and Foggy laughs, delighted.

*

Matt carries him to bed that night, both of them trading lazy kisses until Matt tries to stifle a yawn. “We can pick this up tomorrow, Matty. Go to sleep,” Foggy says, after he presses one more kiss to the hollow of Matt’s throat.

“Yeah?”

“Mm, promise.”

Foggy wakes to the comfortable weight of Matt’s leg draped over his hip the next morning, warmer, safer and happier than he’s felt since he was a kid. He smiles into Matt’s chest and watches as Matt slowly wakes up, a soft exhale, then a deep breath.

He catches the moment Matt realizes Foggy’s there with him. Matt takes another deep breath and breathes him in, then lets loose a sleepy, pleased smile that makes his heart sing. Foggy chuckles and tilts his face up towards Matt’s.

“Good morning, sunshine,” he says, and with the way Matt’s smile grows, brilliant and beautiful, Foggy pretty sure he’s staring at the real deal.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Talking Heads’ This Must Be The Place.
> 
> Come say hi on [Tumblr](ellicelluella.tumblr.com)!


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